While I don't think it is necessary for the 15% nerf, the argument can be made.

Warlocks have additional health due to their method of getting mana back (Which is converted from their life). Their damage CDs are however pretty ridiculous (Dark bargain, Unending Resolve, Soul Link, etc) in not only the sheer amount they have, but the versatility they provide.

Moonkins are quite different in how we use CDs, as well as what our CDs provide. Symbiosis allows us too have our major defensive CD change based on fight (AMS for ionization on Jin'Rokh, Cloak for Static Shock on Lei Shen, Unending Resolve being our good cookie cutter defensive CD), as well as Barkskin (While being fairly weak, does have quite a low CD i.e. can be used on every Quills, Lightning Storm, etc). Heart of the Wild also provides us with 6% additional Stamina, which is severely underestimated or ignored by many (Which will also scale with higher stamina levels for next tier).

The Nature's Swiftness change is something that I don't quite understand, and while we do have other options, the lack of instant cast BR is more annoying to me than taking renewal or the new talent.

All in all, the 15% defensive change hurt as bad as many think it will when compared to other casters, as S priests are losing theirs and Warlocks are losing their 10% reduction as well. Hopefully blizzard comes through with trying to make another form of active mitigation for Moonkin too put us in line with Warlocks for survivability.

Wont really be a nerf to SotF, it just prevents people skipping Solar eclipse as well. Blizzard wants to make sure any unintended mechanics from the talent are removed. Skipping half a cycle every cycle is poor, even though it's comparable to just skipping post-Solar.

In all honesty, I am worried about this expansion seeing so few changes to moonkins over time. From the initial excitement of the new talents in MoP I came to grow steadily disappointed with the spec. It feels clunkier than ever.

Introducing such a spell as Astral Communion was a confession of failure in itself when it comes to giving moonkins the right feel about rotations and transitions. It basically says: "We cannot fix this, take this button and good luck with it". Introducing it as part of a rotation through a RNG mechanic is the culmination of a clusterfuck of bad decisions, basically due to a lack of direction. A spec for which interrupting a cast is a DPS increase and skipping a whole part of its rotation is an attractive prospect speaks volumes about how screwed up it is.

I would not be so bummed if MoP came to fix stuff that was not broken, namely DoT duration and AoE mechanics. Multidotting was too strong? Tone it down then. Mushrooms too bursty? Nerf them, that is ok. But nothing changes the fact that moonkin AoE in Cataclysm was one of the funniest, most satisfactory mechanics a spec has ever had in this game. It involved many things, it allowed you some room for strategy through mushroom placement and, while being forced to camp solar had its drawbacks, it was at the very least effective if done right. Even if through the use of cooldowns and procs you can get by, you have the feeling that your are working twice as much as any other class for it to get the least bang for it. And even if I topped DPS charts with it, I would still hate it.

For me, there are 4 things that would fix most of my qualms with the spec:

- Increasing DoT duration by 4 seconds again.
- Reducing Starfire cast time so that interrupting it to cast SS would not be a DPS gain in any scenario.
- Introducing a system of charges in SS so that procs don't go to waste while allowing for better DPS while on the move.
- Buffing Mushrooms to make their use worthwhile again in combination with multidotting. Personally I think Hurricane/Astral Storm should become a spell you could channel while casting other spells, even if the damage had to be brought down a lot.

As to the 15% damage reduction nerf and the disappearance of NS, I would not mind it if they gave us some kind of active mitigation -we are swimming in mana, it would be nice to actually make it meaningful somehow, possibly through a defensive mechanic? I do hope they have something in the works other than a vague "we have ways to fix it" that includes a reference to resilience. PvPing as moonkin is already hard as it is.

I know we all have our own wishes for the class we play, but I am sad Blizzard has not hinted any moves in either of the aforementioned directions over the course of a whole expansion -I know some of those are widely shared. It really makes me wonder on what to expect of moonkins in the future x-pack.

- Increasing DoT duration by 4 seconds again.
- Reducing Starfire cast time so that interrupting it to cast SS would not be a DPS gain in any scenario.
- Introducing a system of charges in SS so that procs don't go to waste while allowing for better DPS while on the move.
- Buffing Mushrooms to make their use worthwhile again in combination with multidotting. Personally I think Hurricane/Astral Storm should become a spell you could channel while casting other spells, even if the damage had to be brought down a lot.

As to the 15% damage reduction nerf and the disappearance of NS, I would not mind it if they gave us some kind of active mitigation -we are swimming in mana, it would be nice to actually make it meaningful somehow, possibly through a defensive mechanic? I do hope they have something in the works other than a vague "we have ways to fix it" that includes a reference to resilience. PvPing as moonkin is already hard as it is.

Increasing dot duration wont help; If I refresh dots as I leave an eclipse rather than enter one, I can already cycle thru the next eclipse and back again (meaning both dots rolling are eclipsed). Also we need 13 targets to eclipse dot everything; 6 targets allows us both dots on all targets before reapply the eclipsed dot on target one. Increasing length would change nothing in single target, and would leave no time for hurricane, mushrooms or even SS in multi target.

In higher gear levels as Huth said, even SF has such a short cast, with human reaction time its unlikely you'll gain any dps.

The main reason they won't let you stack SS procs is PVP. But If they made SS deal 25-50% less in pvp, but allow it to stack I'd be over the moon. Or make it like echo of the elements for shamans, don't auto cast the second proc, but add a mechanic so that if you starsurge does stack past 1 charge, it does 75% the damage but causes no threat etc 50% damage if it stacks to 2. That way you could save 2 (ofc it would be a dps loss) for movement purposes, but you'd do 100% 75% and 50% damage which is way better than 100% alone, and then lunar shower spamming.

I'd like to see mushrooms worth casting again, placing 3 shrooms down during movement, and exploding for big burst felt satisfying before, now its just not worth doing. With T16 we'll see alot of starsurge procs whilst moving, so 'wasting' 3 globals to place 3 shrooms means they need to pack a punch when you explode them - make them op again, it'll still be hit and miss how effectively you place them if it'll be a dps gain over SS spam. As for making hurricane/astral storm channel-able whilst casting over spells, thats a bad idea. Thats just starfall all over again.

Active mitigation would be nice, more like guardian play style. Spend mana for either a long lasting or stronger barkskin, or a dk conversion -like talent. Mana is converted to hp until cancelled - obviously you can't sustain this during heavy aoe phases due to mana consumption, but something like that could be a great tool to have - or at the very least give us a mana based frenzied regen.

As a whole, I think Balance druids are in a "Goldilocks Zone." Not to weak (WW Monk); not too strong (Warlocks). This is from, primarily, a PVE point-of-view, but nonetheless a view I think we can all agree on. Balance really doesn't need much else, but tweaking the knobs has potentially disastrous effects if left untreated. For the sake of ending this expansion on a good note, for the specc in both PVE and PVP, there have been a lot of balancing issues outside the Balance specc. Hunters being ridiculous in PVP. All three (3) Warlock speccs being very dominant PVE speccs. If Blizzard can get this 'active mitigation' thing working, it will prove to be a good thing for the game moving forward. In the other hand, if they mess this up, they've effectively removed Moonkin PvP from competitive play.

As for the Set Bonus changes, or rather the lack thereof, they really need to change our 4pc. My god it's awful. I'm looking at this other bonuses and can't help but think "Wow, mine is really that awful."

The SOTF change...meh. We probably won't skip post-Lunar. We'll just skip post-Solar to effectively 'guarantee' a proc when we know we want it most. (RNG is RNG, I know. I'd rather have it do one of the following:
1. Grants 100 Eclipse energy after leaving Eclipse. (automatic)
2. Whenever you reach an Eclipse, your next Astral Communion will grant 100 Eclipse energy when used. (reactive, player decision))

It's not in any humanly possible scenario. Reaction time is to slow. All other scenarios are irrelevant.

If I'm not mistaken, you need to have cast less than 0,7 seconds of Starfire for the cancel to be a DPS increase. That is definitely possible to do with regular reactions. And also if the time even is smaller, it's still possible. I've had quite many situations where my next spell is going to be Starfire because of spell queueing but SS procs just a moment before the cast, thus interrupting Starfire for SS within ~0,4 seconds (or maybe even less) of the start of the cast quite possible.

Also seeing your SS proc overwrite during the said Starfire is heartbreaking which happens too often, especially when multidotting.

About 5.4: I really hate the SotF change though, I guess it's going to be FoN all day every day if the 4set is not going to change.

It's probably better DPS on high # of target fights to go with Incarnation and just be forced to ignore the 4pc bonus, but I guess it depends on if there is constant amount of targets like Primordius. In that situation just one additional CA might be better.

And WW monks are one of top (if not the) single target DPS in the game at the moment (browse Ra-Den logs cause it's the closest thing we have at the moment). I think it's fine that they have a niche like that, similar to our niche in multi dotting. Other classes like Mage and Warlock need to be brought down because their niche is everything.

I feel bad about the 4set, I really dont think it is a solution to our problems. Ever since the eclipse bar has been established they have been adjusting and messing with it, because it has not helped much. Moonkins feel like cycling through eclipse phases is the only thing you should care about. Also with my gear now, I cycle through them so damn quick its a joke. What I would love is to see SS procs stack up to three just like treants! now that would be nice for not wasting SS procs too much, and it would help with dps on the move.

I love my utility as a moonkin, and my raidteam loves me for it. The removal of nature's swiftness is my biggest bummer this patch. Not too concerned about my dps output, I have always been able to do well no matter the state of moonkins.

I am concerned first that our "active mit" is barkskin and symbiosis and that nothing is coming as a counterweight to the 15% loss. Overall our healing tools and reduction tools are still in a good place for PVE on 5.4 PTR. DPS druids could use some sort of cacoon spell like disperse or block however.

Level 90 talents are a huge issue still imo. Level 60 is pretty much getting the finishing touches put on it, SoTF, by design is weak for balance but passives are meant to be a little weaker in most cases... well its not completely passive anymore. All tiers so far have really compelling choices so far outside of mass entanglement and DoC and Vigil.

Tier 90 for druids needs to be cleaned up bigtime. HotW is the go-to talent for all specs. Not because all druids are lazy, or because the talent is too strong. DoC is basically ignored for all specs except ferals. The idea of casting healing touch is not a bad one really, but on feral has predatory swiftness. I'm not sure it would be a bad idea to give it to balance at all. Probably everytime you enter eclipse you get an instant nature spell. The effect wouldn't stack and would be dispellable. Boom... NS problem solved, DoC now has more synergy with balance druid rotation. Vigil is just too weak atm for all specs. Not really sure how it should be addressed either, but no one is taking it damage reasons typically.

Anyway tldr, tier 90 needs to be a compelling choice for all specs, like they are intended to be. btw not taking 4set if I have better itemized pieces so hopefully its a work-in-progress.

Well, Warlocks did a mighty fine Mage impersonation and whined so hardcore they got all their main nukes back castable on the move. It's high time Balance Druids (and Shadow Priests) outright revolted. Starfire castable on the move 2013!!!! If nothing else replace that god awful 4pc with it. Then we can "get used" to such quality of life and badger them into making it permanent going into the next expansion.

Well, Warlocks did a mighty fine Mage impersonation and whined so hardcore they got all their main nukes back castable on the move. It's high time Balance Druids (and Shadow Priests) outright revolted. Starfire castable on the move 2013!!!! If nothing else replace that god awful 4pc with it. Then we can "get used" to such quality of life and badger them into making it permanent going into the next expansion.

Warlocks are getting attention b/c KJ's cunning was broken. There was no virtually no movement penalty for the class at all. No other class is going to gain the ability to cast on the move and it's possible shamans will lose some of it as well. Casting while moving 100% of the time doesn't require skill or thought, therefore it's not a good idea for game.

If you're concerned with being interrupted you should try to gem more crit for shooting stars procs. You should get the interupt bar addon as well, try to fake them with a wrath or healing touch, then cast starfire.

You don't seem to understand. They've mostly revereted the KJC nerf. The main nuke for all 3 specs is now back to being 100% castable on the move, now with zero snare debuff. And they're not done whining about it yet so I wouldn't be surprised if Drain Soul, for example, ends up back on the list.

In fact, the only thing in Demo's entire arsenal now with a cast time is Soul Fire, which you only cast with the proc and with high haste levels the cast is probably near the GCD in speed.

Shadow Priests, Balance Druids, and non-fire mages need SOMETHING to help with movement. Absent that, Fire Mages and Warlocks need to have their mobility turned way down. Blizzard was nerfing Warlocks but now they've all but reversed course. It's so nice when the two top damage casters have by 100000 miles the most mobility (and it's not like the two aren't related).

I also like how SotF was originally built as a passive talent for players who didn't want to worry about an extra ability in their rotation, a way for newer players to learn the class while keeping it simple but still getting a small boost to their DPS.

The new version makes the talent require more micro managing than the other two options on the tier, and can actually punish DPS if you used incorrectly. You can use FoN and Inc on CD and get pretty much the full benefit (assuming you use CA on CD as well). Proper usage of SotF would be absolutely essential to getting the benefit from it; it really does feel like throwing darts at a dart board with trying to come up with these talents (and set bonuses for that matter).

The new version makes the talent require more micro managing than the other two options on the tier, and can actually punish DPS if you used incorrectly. You can use FoN and Inc on CD and get pretty much the full benefit (assuming you use CA on CD as well). Proper usage of SotF would be absolutely essential to getting the benefit from it; it really does feel like throwing darts at a dart board with trying to come up with these talents (and set bonuses for that matter).

or not even trying with level 90 talents and randomly scrapping NS for everyone.

Warlocks are getting attention b/c KJ's cunning was broken. There was no virtually no movement penalty for the class at all.

Actually the snare from KJC was a very punishing penalty that was part of the reason blizzard changed it in the first place. Right now not only have they backed down on the KJC changes but actually removed the snare penalty while also buffing fel flame, essentially buffing warlock mobility even further.

If I'm not mistaken, you need to have cast less than 0,7 seconds of Starfire for the cancel to be a DPS increase. That is definitely possible to do with regular reactions. And also if the time even is smaller, it's still possible. I've had quite many situations where my next spell is going to be Starfire because of spell queueing but SS procs just a moment before the cast, thus interrupting Starfire for SS within ~0,4 seconds (or maybe even less) of the start of the cast quite possible.

Also seeing your SS proc overwrite during the said Starfire is heartbreaking which happens too often, especially when multidotting.

About 5.4: I really hate the SotF change though, I guess it's going to be FoN all day every day if the 4set is not going to change.

You are mistaken. You need a far longer remaining cast time on SF for it to be worthwile, so long that even just latency makes it barely possible to react in time. The 0.7s were actually due to a calculation error, interrupting is pretty much never worth it.

If you get heartbroken over SS proc overwrites, you're far to invested in them. It's just a matter of fact.

Originally Posted by ThePlanckEnergy

You don't seem to understand. They've mostly revereted the KJC nerf. The main nuke for all 3 specs is now back to being 100% castable on the move, now with zero snare debuff. And they're not done whining about it yet so I wouldn't be surprised if Drain Soul, for example, ends up back on the list.

Their "main nukes" as you call them are what they cast when they don't have anything better to do. Also known as "filler". They're pretty much their weakest regularly used spells.